The “3P” Framework for Strategic Thought Leadership that Builds Your Business

The 3 tests that any acceptable topic must pass to be in contention.

When it comes to choosing a profitable topic for your audience-first business, whether on Substack or elsewhere, many people consider the exercise as an end in itself: 

• Choose topic 

• Create content 

• Cash out! 

In reality, successful audience-first entrepreneurs, consultants, and freelancers know that choosing a topic is just the initial aspect of choosing the audience you want to serve.

And it’ll take a lot more than mere interest in solving a particular problem or satisfying a desire to understand who you’re talking to. 

Beyond that, profit is often the only consideration given. And while there’s nothing wrong with thinking of making money first, it can’t be the only thing you think about.

Multiple criteria have to be met. 

Aside from profit, you have to consider purpose. In fact, purpose will often be the catalyst for profit, given that you’ll need motivation that transcends compensation to be the leader your audience needs. 

Choosing an endeavor that fulfills your personal sense of purpose is often represented as a Venn diagram of overlapping considerations, only one of which deals directly with money:

• What does the world need? 

• What do you love? 

• What are you good at? 

• What can you get paid for? 

I think about choosing a topic in a slightly different way. It’s a list of three things to take into account, with purpose at the center of it all. 

These three elements are: 

• Profit 

• Purpose 

• Problems 

Let’s take a deeper dive into each. Rather than three successive steps, think of each as a test that any acceptable topic must pass to be in contention.